November 14

Hello Everyone!

I have had a good week!  This week was a good week.  It was also transfer week, and I got transferred!!!  What??  I was super not expecting that.  I thought I was going to be in the office until February.  But I guess I was either a bad office elder or God needs me here in Sto. Domingo.  I'm half glad and half sad that I'm leaving.  It will be nice to be able to  just focus on inviting others unto Christ full time again, but I will miss all the nice people in the Laoag 1st Ward.  My new companion is Elder Paulo, and he is super nice!  He is really good at playing the Piano!  He is a Filipino from Cagayan De Oro (in the south of the Philippines.)  

Not much exciting happened last week in Laoag.  We got audited, so we had an accountant (President Ardon) in the office all  week looking through everything in the finance stuff.  He was a nice guy, and we got some free food out of it, so I guess it was alright.

One cool insight that I had during my scripture study this week was from 1st Nephi in Lehi's dream. After Lehi went and partook of the fruit himself, he began to look around, and one of the first things he saw was his family "Standing as if they knew not where to go"  He obviously wanted them to taste the fruit as well, and so he called to them, and soon they were there with them.  One thing that the Spirit whispered to me as I read that was the importance of the role of fathers in families.  They really are supposed to be the leaders of their family, and the other members have a responsibility to listen to him, and give him the respect he deserves.  It has changed my view about teaching families. A lot of the time in the Philippines the wife will want to listen and learn about the Gospel, but the father is busy, and to some degree indifferent.  But this week that I realized that that is not God's way.  

One of the strongest RC families that we have in Laoag was baptized because the father first had a desire to investigate the Gospel, and then he invited the family to come with him.  I hope that I can help more families be like that, and so I have now decided to place more of an emphasis on helping the father's see the importance of the Gospel in their lives as well. 

Have a good week!

Elder Childs